


Choose-Your-Own Holmes/Watson Adventure!

by JaneTurenne



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-17
Updated: 2009-11-17
Packaged: 2017-10-03 05:07:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 10,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaneTurenne/pseuds/JaneTurenne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Holmes and Watson spend an afternoon reading letters from their fans.  What happens next is ALL UP TO YOU!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Beginning

It might have been a strain on their friendship, if all the letters were addressed with the same name. As neither biographer nor subject eclipsed the other, however, there were plenty of letters-- and, therefore, plenty of madness-- to go round.

In the early days, the flow of fan correspondence was fairly light. _A Study in Scarlet_ and _The Sign of the Four_ brought in a few kindly epistles for the doctor, praising his writing and encouraging him to tell more, and the occasional admiring note for Holmes. Many of these, Watson was surprised and touched to learn, came from little boys who, in the words of Timothy Carver, age eight, wanted "to be a ditektive just like you."

"With such spelling at that age, I very much doubt it," Holmes had commented with a sniff, but Watson knew that his friend was only trying to cover the little smile occasioned by Master Timothy's further comment that he "mired" Mr. Holmes very much.

Yes, the _Beeton's_ and _Lippincott's_ folk had been fairly toothless-- pleasant, even. The _Strand_ lot, however, were another matter. During the months when the first two dozen short stories were busy electrifying London, Dr. Watson took great care to avoid the stacks of mail that his publishers regularly forwarded. It was not that he expected any unkindness from his readers; on the contrary, he supposed that their praise might in fact have been very useful to him just then. But so many of his correspondents were inclined to ask questions like "What is Mr. Holmes doing now?" which, though simple in themselves, reminded Watson that the paralyzed numbness that had followed his matched pair of bereavements was not so deep as to render him impervious to pain.

Even in those darkest days, however, Watson was a gentleman, and a gentleman did not destroy letters unopened, especially when they were kindly meant. The old steamer trunk in the attic spent the early years of the 1890's slowly filling with sealed envelopes-- all the more quickly after November '93, for every single reader of _The Strand_ seemed to feel that his dismay, anger or condolences over the death of the Great Detective must, in duty bound, be communicated to the author of "The Adventure of the Final Problem." And then, just as the letters seemed likely to overflow their brass and leather prison, March of '94 passed into April, and a miracle occurred.

It was not many weeks after Watson and his trunk full of letters returned in triumph to Baker Street that the Doctor decided the time had, at last, come. Holmes' assistance was, with exaggerated grudgingness, secured ("After all, Holmes, more than a few of them were written to you"), the battered steamer was dragged into the sitting room and ceremoniously unsealed, and the pair settled down to their task. For the first hour or two, it was much the same experience it had been in the early days-- the letters were polite, complimentary and, overall, forgettable, though a few stood out for one reason or another. As Watson was setting aside a letter from Mrs. Cheedle of Hounslow (who seemed to have taken "The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb" as an invitation to moralize on the tendency of young men to strike out in business for themselves at a rather younger age than was advisable; Mrs. Cheedle's sermons had arrived once a month like clockwork, and Watson had already encountered two others in his last half-hour of reading), his eye was caught by...

 

[1)An envelope of the most lurid pink imaginable.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/14513/chapters/18492)  
OR  
[2)A small, white envelope addressed in ink of a positively Stygian blackness.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/14513/chapters/18509)


	2. Middle #1

...an envelope of the most lurid pink imaginable.

'Oh, not _another one,' thought Watson with a sigh. He lifted the letter gingerly from the trunk, between the very tips of his fingers, as though it were highly poisonous and likely to attack. The sickly scent of cheap _eau de cologne_ and Watson's deeply grieved sigh drew Holmes out of his latest letter-- a surprisingly literate communique from a young Russian gentleman interested in obtaining permission to translate some of Holmes' scholarly works-- and attracted his attention to the letter in Watson's hand. The detective groaned._

"Which of us is it this time, Watson?" he asked, hopelessly. "On whose shoulders is the blow destined to fall?"

Watson turned the envelope and scanned the direction. "Thank God, this one's for...

 

[1a)...you," he said, with an impish grin. "I'm not sure I could take another one like that last..."](http://archiveofourown.org/works/14513/chapters/18495)  
OR  
[1b)...me," he said, though his tone was far from enthusiastic. "Not that I enjoy the cursed things, but, as your doctor, I really cannot recommend you to indulge in any more notes of this variety..."](http://archiveofourown.org/works/14513/chapters/18507)


	3. Ending #1a

"...you," he said, with an impish grin. "I'm not sure I could take another one like that last, begging to know whether my eyes are really 'the same beautiful blue I see in my dreams.' Catch me putting anything about my eyes in _The Strand_ after that!"

"I do hereby swear that your lady readers will never have the truth about those emerald orbs from me," Holmes solemnly pronounced. "Well, there's no sense prolonging the agony. Hand it over, old fellow."

Watson complied, but made no move to open a new letter himself. Unless he missed his guess, Holmes' reaction to this letter would be well worth watching. Holmes was well aware of Watson's scrutiny, but he allowed the Doctor his moment of _schadenfreude_. At least one of them would derive some enjoyment from this particular piece of correspondence.

Holmes stretched out an arm to the mantelpiece, picked up the handsome silver letter-opener which had been Mycroft's Christmas gift some years ago (in company with a letter which had recently come into Mycroft's possession which provided the final bit of evidence incriminating a clever forger against whom Holmes had been building a case for months. In his excitement over the letter Holmes had absentmindedly tossed the letter-opener in the direction of the wastepaper basket, and only Watson's timely intervention had rescued the gift), and neatly slit the offensively-tinted envelope. The three sheets of notepaper inside were of the same nauseating hue, and even more strongly perfumed than the envelope had been.

With the slightest twitch of lips and nose, Holmes abandoned himself to the inevitable and started to read.

Watson kept his eyes glued on Holmes' face as his friend's eyes made their way through the pages. By the end of the first, Holmes' mouth was twisted into an impressively acrobatic grimace. By halfway through the second, he was beginning to turn green. He soldiered bravely on for as long as he was able, but a few lines after beginning the third page he gave a strangled cry, buried his head in his hands, and wailed, "I very much doubt if that is even anatomically possible-- but if it is, please God let me never have the misfortune to find out!"

Watson couldn't remember the last time he had laughed so hard. Wiping away his tears of mirth, he sprang from his seat and perched himself at Holmes' shoulder, peering at the letter. His eyes widened. "Sweet merciful heaven, one must give her credit for inventiveness, at the very least!"

Holmes' glare could have sunk parsley into butter on the coldest day of January. "I cannot give anyone credit for anything where such insanity is concerned. What is the point of it all, Watson? How can anyone see any appeal in acts of such...such...such unsanitary and unthinking physicality? I am not referring exclusively the extraordinary and unbelievable proposals of this lady; they only serve by their extremity to illuminate the absurdity of all those physical expressions of love from which the well-ordered mind ought to recoil. Take kissing, for example. How utterly senseless a demonstration, to press one's edacious and vocal apparatus against that of another person as a show of affection! Truly, what could possibly be considered romantic about such a thing?"

Watson smiled, but, knowing that his friend was speaking entirely seriously, he responded in kind. "Well, part of the pleasure of a kiss is mental, I suppose-- the exaltation of being allowed such a liberty in the first place, the joy of knowing oneself to be loved and the answering upsurge of affection, a feeling of wellness and wholeness and completion. But the physical element is also more interesting than you might suppose. The lips are extraordinarily sensitive, you know, far more so than, for example, the fingertips, and so a kiss produces a sort of tingling feeling quite absent from other forms of physical contact. And even if the lips are the only parts in contact-- which is seldom enough the case-- a good kiss may induce goose-flesh on the arms, or cause the hairs of one's neck to stand on end, or produce a warmth in the pit of one's stomach, or send shivers down the spine, each of which is another, independently pleasant factor. One must take the whole picture into account, you know."

Holmes had listened to this speech with interest, but waved a dismissive hand when Watson had finished. "A very pretty little appeal, Doctor, but hardly convincing. I am afraid I still do not see what a kiss could do for me that a well-played bit of Bach could not."

Holmes turned away to toss the letter onto the unlit grate; it would be cooler in the evening, once the April sun went down, and that wretched perfume would burn well, if nothing else. In consequence, he did not see the extraordinary series of emotions that were passing over his companion's face. But he could hardly help feeling the hand that that slid onto the back of his neck.

"Then allow me to show you," said Watson, quietly, and before Holmes could object, he leaned down and pressed their lips together.

For the first few moments, Holmes eyes stared in shock at the well-known face so perilously close to his. And then, quite abruptly, his eyelids fluttered shut.

As kisses go, it was rather a chaste one-- lips barely parted, meeting each other with gentle pressure. Watson lingered for long seconds, neither demanding nor requesting more, and then, with exquisite slowness, pulled away.

Holmes remained absolutely still. He did not open his eyes, or attempt to speak. Watson was just beginning to feel somewhat panicky around the edges when there was a polite rap at the sitting-room door. He darted over to open it, putting as much space as possible between himself and his friend. By the time Watson had opened the door and obligingly removed the tea-tray from Mrs. Hudson's hands, Holmes was looking more or less his usual self, though perhaps rather pinker about the cheeks.

Watson, feeling not quite secure enough to look at Holmes while he spoke, occupied himself with teaspoons and sugar cubes. "Was that demonstration sufficient to convince you of the distinction between... what was it... 'the pressing of one's edacious and vocal apparatus against that of another person' and Bach?" he dared finally, his insides in knots.

Holmes rose from his chair and strode determinedly in the direction of the door. Watson's heart was in his boots, but, just as he had decided to follow Holmes in his flight and beg his friend's forgiveness for his unpardonable breach of decency, he heard the lock of the door turn from the inside. His eyebrows shot up and he set down the teapot rather hastily. Watson fought down the urge to turn until Holmes' returning footsteps were very near behind him indeed, and, when at last he tore his eyes away from the tea things, it was to find Holmes gazing at him in his most inscrutable fashion. With a rush of relief, however, Watson noted that the detective's blush had, if anything, deepened.

"It was certainly a more interesting experiment than I should have hypothesized," said Holmes, in a strange, uncertain voice, "but you know, Watson, a scientist never draws conclusions based upon a single test. Results must be reproducible if one is to depend upon them, after all."

"Quite true," Watson replied, realizing for the first time how significant two inches difference in height could be, under the right circumstances.

"For example, it would be interesting to determine whether the experience is a significantly different one for the kisser than the kissed," Holmes put in, stepping still closer to the Doctor.

"Scientifically interesting, that is," Watson added, gripping the edges of the tea table as insurance against the increasing unreliability of his knees.

"Precisely, my dear Watson," Holmes replied. "Scientifically." The word had barely left his lips before Holmes had discovered that kissing was indeed quite as pleasant as being kissed, but he decided, rather wisely, that there was no sense in rushing the experience. It never hurt to make absolutely sure.

**********

There were a great number of other experiments carried out-- and, for the sake of scientific rigour, reproduced-- at 221B before the sitting room door was unlocked. And in the early hours of the morning, a certain detective slipped delicately from the embrace of a certain slumbering medico, made his silent way back into the sitting room, and completed the covert rescue of three sheets of paper and an envelope of truly horrible pink, locking the lot away in his desk drawer. There was no doubt that the letter itself was a nightmare; his opinion of _that_ had not been altered in the last few hours. But, be that as it may, Holmes thought, as he crept back to his own bed, it had turned out to be quite the kindest piece of correspondence he had ever received.

**The End**


	4. Ending #1b

"...me," he said, though his tone was far from enthusiastic. "Not that I enjoy the cursed things, but, as your doctor, I really cannot recommend you to indulge in any more notes of this variety. I was afraid your heart would give out during that letter of thanks from Miss Hunter."

"It very nearly did," Holmes commented wryly. "I cannot express how little I desired to know _why_ she thought of me while she was 'lying on her bed trembling all over.' "

Watson grinned, but it quickly faded as he glanced back down at letter in his hand. "It's my turn to face the firing squad now, I'm afraid," he commented sadly. "Ah, well, nothing for it but to get the thing over with."

Rapidly, but with precision, Watson tore open the envelope and extracted the pages within. Holmes, though feigning interest in his own letter, kept a surreptitious eye on the Doctor's progress. Watson read quickly, with the air of a child trying to swallow down his medicine before his mind registers the taste, and when he had finished he settled back against the cushions of the settee with a look of discomfort. "The letters from women who were clever enough to read the obituaries are so much worse," he said quietly, with uncharacteristic bitterness.

Holmes knew very well that his powers as a soother of hurts had always been inadequate even to the demands of friendship, back in the days before his abrupt disappearance. He and Watson were so very unlike in some ways, Holmes reflected-- the doctor felt so many things, and felt them so deeply, whereas Holmes himself could think of only one person in the wide world capable of affecting him so profoundly. That single emotional attachment had been enough to send him fleeing to the ends of the earth in an attempt to escape his own unruly and, he had believed, unrequited feelings. He could not imagine what it must be like to be Watson, buffeted night and day by the storms of his own emotionality. The strength that it must take to endure such torments was incomprehensible-- though the fact that Watson was possessed of incomprehensible strength was hardly a revelation. But occasionally even Watson needed comforting and, since the day when he had returned from the dead, Holmes knew that his obligation to provide it was even more pronounced than before. After all, things were different between them now-- a change almost entirely due, Holmes was inclined to believe, to a chance discovery during his years as a walking corpse.

During his sojourn in Khartoum, Holmes, in one of his many efforts during those three blank years to turn his mind from its accustomed track, had buried himself in the rich history and culture of the Arab world. His Arabic was quite impeccable, but one day, as he had searched through the extensive personal library of one of his new scholarly acquaintances, he had come across a word on a spine which he had not recognized. "Honored sir, perhaps you will be kind enough to enlighten an ignorant foreigner," he had, with the self-deprecation that was so necessary to Eastern ideas of politeness, petitioned his host after dinner that evening. "Would you please explain to me the meaning of the word _ghazal_?"

Ahmet, who was ancient as the hills and as wise as he was wizened, had replied in English, "I should not have thought that you would take an interest in such things, Mr. Verner-- you English are such cold people. There is not many an Englishman with poetry in his soul, but perhaps you are one of the few?"

"Poetry?" Holmes had replied, beginning to wish that he had not asked at all.

"A _ghazal_ is a poem of a very special kind. It is the song of the lover who will never attain that perfect beloved for whom he longs, an ode to the beauty of that pain which comes of loving something which is forever out of reach."

Holmes had, quite unaccountably, felt his control slipping away. It came, he supposed, of no longer being Sherlock Holmes-- and yet, of being unable to escape the ache that was Sherlock Holmes' constant companion.

"The beauty?" he had choked out, in a voice far more hoarse than he would have wished. "What beauty can there be in such agony as that?"

Ahmet's clever dark eyes had begun a minute study of Holmes' face. "Ah, I was right, then," he announced. "There is some poetry in you after all. It is in flight from this impossible love, then, that you have traveled so far from the world where you belong?"

Had he been himself, he would have summoned all the cold condescension he could muster and denied it. But what did it matter what William Verner thought, how he felt, whom he loved? And would it not be a relief, a tremendous and unexpected relief, finally to admit it?

"Yes," he had softly said. "Yes, it is so."

"Then you must go back," Ahmet had said, simply.

"Why would I possibly want to do that?" Holmes had asked, churlishly, childishly.

"Because that love which the coward finds unattainable, the brave man may yet achieve. And, even if one finds that one's love is past gaining after all, in the sight of one's beloved one may learn to find the beauty in the pain."

Holmes had spent the next year running from Ahmet's advice, but always, it seemed, running towards England. And one day, finally, those words had been enough to push him across the channel, and he found himself, frock-coated, top-hatted and brilliantined, ensconced in an armchair in a certain set of lodgings in Pall Mall.

"You'll have a job explaining it all to your doctor," had been Mycroft's cool response to Holmes' quite unbelievable story about the pulling power of the Adair case. "You'll have to go easy on the poor fellow, of course. It wouldn't do to add to his burdens at such a time."

"At such a time?" Holmes had repeated quizzically.

"You were not aware that his wife had died? Seven months ago last Thursday...Sherlock! Where the devil..."

And he was running, running as though the Hound of the Moor were on his tail, running through streets that were still, three years later, imprinted upon his brain, running up the steps, past the red lamp, past the little brass nameplate of "John H. Watson, M.D.", past the frightened and indignant housemaid, into the consulting room which, mercifully, held only one occupant, and slamming the door behind him.

Watson had looked up. He had blanched. And then he had said, in a lost but matter-of-fact voice that Holmes would never succeed in effacing from his memory, "I've finally gone mad, then."

It had all shown on Holmes' face, every bit of it. He had allowed it to, for he owed Watson that much, and so very much more. He had walked slowly over to Watson's desk, guilt and fear gaining sudden ascendancy over the passionate haste that had driven him there, and knelt beside the chair.

"John," he had implored, placing his hands on Watson's arms. "John, forgive me, please forgive me John. I did not know, I did not hear about..." he hesitated, lifted a hand to trail it across the band of black encircling Watson's forearm, "Not until this very day. I would have come just as soon as I heard, I swear it. I _did_ come as soon as I heard."

Watson was staring at the hands pressing into his flesh. "You are dead," he said, his voice almost childlike in its incredulity. "You cannot be here. You are dead."

Holmes drew up Watson's hands to rest on his shoulders. "I am alive, Watson," he replied. "I am not a dream, or the product of a diseased brain. You cannot touch a ghost."

Watson brought his face very close to Holmes', studying every eyelash, and his hands began to move. Holmes' neck, mouth, brow, hair, cheeks, chest-- each was caressed in turn, in a clumsy, meandering way that had nothing of passion about it. Watson's eyes grew steadily wider as his wandering hands continued to meet solid resistance at every turn. Finally, he moved his hands back to Holmes' shoulders, leaned his forehead against that of his friend, and in voice that was finally his own, though it emerged from him in a whisper, asked, "Holmes?"

Holmes let out a positive sob of relief. "Watson..."

Who had kissed whom was a question neither of them ever bothered to ask. By the time either was at his leisure to consider the point, they had exchanged such an infinitude of kisses that one more or less to either man's credit was hardly worth quibbling over.

That had been thirty-eight days ago exactly, Holmes noted, in his usual precise way. Since then he had learned a great many things about the conducting of _affaires du coeur_, but the art of giving comfort had not been one-- especially when the hurt in need of easing involved the death of the woman who had, all unwittingly, been his rival. He gathered his courage and gave it his level best.

"Why anyone should believe that the condolences of a stranger would provide more succor than pain I cannot imagine. Would you like me to find the writer and give her a stern lecture about manners? I am sure I could manage to trace the envelope..."

Watson, to Holmes' surprise and gratification, smiled. "I was not referring to the tendency of well-intentioned readers to offer rather inept condolences-- though that is bad enough. Nor do I think you would have any trouble at all in locating the author, as she is, in fact, thoroughly eager to be found. What I meant was, the letters from women whose design is to marry me are quite a bit more provoking than those by writers who simply want me in their beds."

Holmes blinked. He blinked again. "To marry you?" he said, in a voice that wavered between flabbergasted and dangerous. Watson, characteristically optimistic, responded to the former.

"Of course. You receive your fair share of more-than-friendly correspondence from readers of _The Strand_, Holmes-- not to mention from the Miss Hunter's of the world. Surely some of them have done their best to point out their eligibility and to suggest, perhaps, that if you were ever in need of a bride..."

"No," Holmes replied. "While I have, as you say, been the recipient of more letters than I care to think of which might easily be described as 'more-than-friendly,' I'm afraid that the class of women who prefer melancholic, drug-addled consulting detectives to brave, upstanding warrior-poet-physicians are not inclined to care overmuch for the proprieties."

Holmes had attempted to maintain a level tone, but Watson had finally caught the strained note and traced it back to its source. Watson's first, kindest instinct was to reassure. His second instinct was to tease. If there was one thing that Watson had learned in thirteen years of dealing with Sherlock Holmes, it was that first instincts rarely garnered the best results where his friend was concerned.

"That's too bad, Holmes. Most of the women who try to present themselves as matrimonial prospects are simply an annoyance, but one does sometimes come across one who seems saner and more interesting than the rest. Occasionally it's nice to consider the fact that one's options are open..."

Holmes' eyes flashed. "Your options are _not_ open, Watson."

"Aren't they?" Watson asked, in a would-be innocent tone. "I'm not so old, after all, and between medicine and writing I bring in a respectable income. And while I was never particularly handsome, I've not yet entirely lost such looks as I once had. Not to mention the fact that the poetical turn that you so dislike comes in handy where wooing is concerned. Yes, I think I could make myself appear rather eligible, if I ever found a suitable lady."

Watson wasn't sure he'd ever seen Holmes turn quite that shade of purple before. "You are mistaken about three things, Watson."

Watson fought back a smile. "Please, my dear Holmes, enlighten me."

"First, Watson, to say that you are, or were ever, not particularly handsome is only true in the same way as the statement "the Atlantic Ocean is not particularly wet": the sheer insufficiency of the descriptors is the only thing that renders the negative justified. Second, while I have indeed been known on occasion to make disparaging marks about your flair for the poetic, I have recently come to understand that there are certain occasions when it can be put to quite spectacular use. And thirdly, you would _not_ be able to make yourself appear eligible to any suitable lady, because if I ever even began to entertain the _hint_ of a notion that you had found a lady whom you considered suitable, I should make very, very, very sure that you never had the slightest opportunity to woo or to win her."

"Am I to understand that you object to the idea of me marrying again, Holmes? Of course, it is still far too soon for me to be thinking of such things, but I had thought that perhaps someday..."

"You are to understand," Holmes ground out, "that I will not under _any circumstances_ countenance you marrying again, _ever_. I positively forbid it."

"That is rather dictatorial of you," Watson commented mildly. "But after all, Holmes, it might be the safer thing, for the both of us. I really think I ought to consider..."

It happened far too fast for Watson to even recognize the motion until he found himself on his back, staring up at the livid consulting detective pinning him bodily to the floor. "NO."

"Why?" Watson's pupils were rather larger than usual, and he squirmed, his hips brushing against Holmes' in an only half involuntary way. He made no move, however, to resist the hands trapping his wrists, and the corners of his mouth curled.

Holmes had suspected that he was being toyed-with, but until now he had not been absolutely sure. "You know very well why," he growled, leaning his head down to nip at Watson's neck.

"Yes," Watson agreed, with a stifled sigh, "but I want to hear you say it."

Holmes pulled back, desiring to watch Watson's face. "Because you belong to me," said Holmes, with less possessiveness and more emotion than he had intended. "Because you are mine, as I am yours, and I do not intend to share you. Not ever again."

Watson gazed solemnly back at Holmes, and nodded. "Good," he said simply, and leaned up to claim a kiss.

The rest of the afternoon was lost to letters.

**********

In the end, Holmes insisted on tearing the pink envelope, and its sickly-scented contents, into minute bits, before depositing the lot onto the fire. He trusted his Watson, and he always would-- but one could not be too careful where marriage was concerned.

 

**The End**


	5. Middle #2

...a small, white envelope addressed in ink of a positively Stygian blackness.

Watson's curiosity was piqued immediately-- not by any peculiarity of the envelope or the hand, both of which were respectably ordinary, but by the unusual fact that it was directed jointly to "Dr. John Watson and Mr. Sherlock Holmes". Most letter writers drew a strict distinction between the writer and detective, the facts and their presentation. It was rather a pleasant change to have a correspondent who viewed the two men jointly as 'the firm.' It made Watson feel as though he had finally earned the title of 'colleague,' which had never failed to thrill him even after so many occasions of being introduced by Holmes. Employed in this happy train of thought, Watson reached for the envelope and glanced up at his companion.

Holmes was just returning a sheaf of rather ornate notepaper to its envelope and, seeing Watson eyeing the letter, explained, "Another of those would-be clients-- an earl, in this case, whose diamonds developed the uncanny ability to disappear-- who seem to have believed that your publishers' was the most sensible place to direct their inquiries. Sometimes I shudder to think how many interesting cases I must have missed by now as a result of the sheer idiocy of the persons involved."

Watson couldn't help smiling. "Since you've just finished, come here and read this one with me. It's addressed to the both of us, and I intend to save my voice for later in the day when you tire of letters and I'm forced to read them aloud by way of bribing you into attention."

Holmes laughed. "You do have rather a soothing voice, Watson," he commented, as he decamped from his armchair and walked over to join his friend on the settee.

"Nonsense," replied the doctor with a grin. "You simply refuse to admit that your eyesight isn't what it was. Someday you _will_ have to give in and invest in a pair of reading glasses."

"Even if your premise were valid-- and I certainly will not grant any such thing-- your conclusion would be erroneous, my dear Watson. Eyeglasses are thoroughly unnecessary. I have my magnifying lens for cases, and my Doctor for the printed page. Further apparati should only be cumbersome."

Watson attempted to be annoyed at Holmes' presumption, but could not seem to feel anything but pleased. Turning his attention to the letter in his hands as Holmes settled in beside him, he peeled open the flap and withdrew a single sheet of neatly creased paper of the same unexceptional and unexceptionable quality as the envelope. Watson unfolded the sheet, and saw that it contained only one sentence, written in clear, resolute capitals:

 

MAY ALL THE TORMENTS OF THIS WORLD AND THE NEXT   
BE UNLEASHED UPON YOU,   
YOU FILTHY PAIR OF SODOMITES.

 

The silence and stillness of the sitting room would, in Ancient Greece, have been gods, so undeniably and actively present had they suddenly become. Watson, ever the writer, observed in some strange far-off corner of his mind the unyielding correctness of the punctuation. There was something in the finality of that period that elevated the note from simply unpleasant to the realms of the truly terrible. Holmes, too, was subject to his own habit of noting-- he knew, for example, that the writer was left-handed, educated at Eton and Cambridge, and a Catholic by sympathy if not by practice. But neither man, if questioned, would have said that he was thinking of the minutiae.

The clearing of a throat broke tumultuously through the frozen atmosphere. The voice that followed it was hoarse and strained.

"Our anonymous correspondent is obviously both uncivil and mistaken in his facts... but he is not entirely wrong. At least, not where I am concerned."

 

[2a) The cataclysmic paper trembled in Watson's grip, and there was something in his eyes of the condemned prisoner who has just come face to face with his executioner.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/14513/chapters/18518)  
OR  
[2b) Holmes had drawn himself up very straight in his seat; he always held on tightest to his dignity at the moments when he needed it most.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/14513/chapters/18526)


	6. Ending #2a

The cataclysmic paper trembled in Watson's grip, and there was something in his eyes of the condemned prisoner who has just come face to face with his executioner. His mouth, however, was set in a line of absolute resolution.

"I have often wondered how you never managed to deduce it before now, Holmes. Ever since I first came to understand the extent of your powers, I have lived in perpetual fear that one day you would suddenly put the pieces together and look at me and see...unless I am very much mistaken, and you have known all along?"

Watson's look was almost hopeful, in distinct contrast to the note of despair in his voice. Holmes knew Watson too well to pretend to misunderstand him, but to understand and to believe are two very different actions, and Watson's implication was far too shocking to admit of belief.

"Watson, are you attempting to tell me that you are an invert?" He almost added a 'surely not!', but his ever-methodical mind stopped the words just short of his lips, demanding a sound and logical reason why the thing must be impossible. 'Because this is _Watson_, model of the English gentleman...because I would have, _must_ have, noticed before now...because it would mean that I, Sherlock Holmes, have been living with a criminal all these years...' No, none of those was anything like proof. His mind in a whirl, Holmes turned to look at the man beside him, who had so suddenly been transformed into a stranger.

Watson swallowed hard. "Not very successfully, it seems," he said, the attempt at levity vanquished when the words came out in a voice barely more than a whisper.

Finally, after far too long, Holmes hit upon an objection which seemed to bear some factual weight. "Mary?" he asked, in confusion. "You loved her, Watson. I was _sure_ of that..." 'You were sure of a great many things,' said a voice in the back of his mind, but he pushed it away.

Watson's discomfort increased. He had known there would be questions, but he had hoped to begin with the simple ones. Trust Holmes to go straight to the heart of the matter. "I did love her, as best I could. She was a wonderful woman," he replied. "I married for all the wrong reasons--because I was looking for something, because I wanted to believe that I could have that kind of life, because I was running away-- but I married _her_ for the right ones. I tried, tried so hard to convince myself that it was enough, and nine hundred ninety-nine days out of a thousand I succeeded. In six years of marriage, only twice..." Watson struggled against the words, as though the right ones could undo the past, "...only twice did I betray her trust."

Such an innocuous phrase, Holmes thought. Such pallid words, to convey-- what, exactly? Frenzied, feverish groping in a back room somewhere, rough and mindless and over almost as soon as it had begun...the strange, slick heat of an eager mouth, as unknown as a stranger's whether or not it was one's own...miles of naked, sweat-stained skin, and paradise to be gained at the small price of utter submission..or worst, worst of all, whispered words of reverent passion and the tight clasp of worshipful bodies, a grotesque parody of that very marriage bed from which it was meant to be an escape...

The images crashed on Holmes in waves, unbroken in spite of his defenses, and without even the comfort of vagary, for his relentless imagination refused to substitute another where it knew Watson belonged. Disgust surged through him, accompanied by another emotion which he could not name. It was not, he insisted, jealousy. He did not find relations between a man and a man to be more abhorrent than the similar acts performed between men and women--in fact, rather less, if only because he considered men as a whole the more sensible sex-- but he could not imagine himself participating in such a farce no matter what the gender of his partner. The noise, the mess, the irrationality, the loss of control were objections enough, not to mention the possible consequences in the forms of arrest, disgrace, or, with a woman, children. If Holmes were honest with himself, however, none of these was his primary reason for celibacy. His aversion was bone-deep and instinctive, and he felt no compulsion to apologize for it. And yet, some part of him wished at this moment that he felt and acted as other men did. It would have made the feeling coursing through his veins so much easier to comprehend.

It amounted to this: Watson was _his_ Watson. He had tolerated Mary, barely, because she offered Watson the things that Holmes could not; between the two of them, Holmes and Mary, sword and distaff, Watson's every need ought to have been well-tended. To learn that Watson had turned to another man for something, anything, which he might have asked of Holmes... it rankled, and no mistake. Holmes did not want Watson in his bed any more than he wanted anyone else, but he wanted _Watson_.

"Oh, _only_ twice," he hissed, permitting the doctor to glimpse his anger but not its depths. "That must be a very great comfort to you. If you had committed homosexual adultery _three_ times, it would indeed have been reprehensible, but twice..."

Holmes had never seen Watson look so much like the photograph he kept locked in his top desk drawer-- the whiteness of his skin was so unnatural, the stiffness of his posture so pronounced. _Good_, Holmes thought, viciously. _Let him feel it. I want him to feel it._

Despite the outrage in his words, Holmes' voice was level and cold, harsh but not heated. "No doubt our friends at the Yard would be similarly relieved. I am sure they would admit that the law can make an exception, since it _only_ happened twice, and thereby save themselves the unhappy duty of hauling in Dr. Watson. After all, who among them could bear the thought of arresting such a fellow? Brave, caring, upstanding Dr. Watson, chivalrous to the core, kind to all in need, spinner of sweet tales; generous, patriotic, _perfect_ Dr. Watson, to whom Socrates might have pointed and said, 'Behold, the very ideal of the gentleman'? No, such a man as the doctor could never do wrong. That friend of his, on the other hand... Cold, strange, cutting Mr. Holmes, who only does good incidentally; Narcissus as machine, seeing everything, feeling nothing, serving only his own cool mental appetites. If Dr. Watson has gone astray, it must be Holmes' fault. After all, they lived together for so many years. It must be thence that the good doctor acquired his unnatural tastes. Holmes could not possibly have failed to notice his friend's depravity, therefore he must have been complicit in it. Let us have _him_ in the dock, and let the poor doctor go free. After all, it was _only_ twice!"

Holmes became aware, suddenly, that he had, at some point, stood from the settee and begun to pace up and down the sitting room. He was already aware that his speech had wandered in quite the same fashion. He did not care. "Did you think of that, Watson? Did it occur to you that, if you were caught, I would no doubt be suspected as well? Or was your mind only on your sweet Mary, and what you were doing to her? Perhaps you did not even get so far as that? It must be difficult to think of anything at all, I suppose, with another man's cock in your..."

"Stop!" Watson had risen too, two spots of red now marring his cheeks. "Just stop! I will _not_ allow you to play the martyr, not about this. I admit that I did not stop to think whether you could be jailed for my crimes, but you must grant, it is absurd to consider whether or not one is convicting a corpse!" The two men shook in unison, anger whipping their heartbeats into a rapid duet. "I did not fall prey to my vices until _after_ you left, _after_ you sat for _hours_ on the rocks above that _damned_ waterfall and _watched me_ tear myself apart searching for some slightest shred of hope that you might yet live. It was not until I came home to England, after seventy-two straight hours of traveling in which I never once, even during the nightmares that were the closest thing I had to sleep, let go of your cursed cigarette case. I got off the train in London and I couldn't bear the thought of going home, couldn't stand the pity, the sympathy, the coddling. I needed to forget, and I went about it the only way I knew how, and I will _not_ apologize to you for it! Not when a single bloody _word_ from you could have stopped it!"

They were face to face, now, too close. Holmes struggled to keep a hold on his indignation, and his voice, when it came, was softer than it should have been.

"And the second time?"

"The night after your funeral. For the same reason." Watson felt the ache of it break over him again, jarring and bizarre with the man for whom he grieved standing less than a foot in front of him.

Holmes nodded slowly, avoiding Watson's eyes, and then stepped back a pace to sink into his armchair. Watson saw his friend deflate, felt it echo within himself. He glanced down at the paper still clutched in his hand, and released it, half-consciously. As it fell he turned, walked to his own chair, and sat.

There was a taut, anticipatory flavor to the silence. Finally Holmes released a long breath, closed his eyes, and asked, "Are you in love with me, Watson?"

Watson was too emotionally worn to be surprised, but he wished to God Holmes hadn't asked him now. He had so little strength left at present. He gathered such last shreds as he could find, and applied them to making the words sound convincing. "No, Holmes. You are my dearest friend, but my feelings for you have nothing about them of romance."

It was a lie. Holmes knew it beyond any possibility of doubt. It was a lie, but the fact that Watson was willing to tell it was enough. "Very well, then. That's an end of the subject."

Watson looked up. Holmes had on his inscrutable face, and was leaning back into the cushions as though quite at his ease. "That's an end of the subject?" he repeated, in shock.

"I have nothing more to ask. Have you anything more to tell?"

Watson struggled to get his thoughts in order. "You do not object to living with an invert?"

"I have apparently done so for many years already, and feel myself none the worse for the experience. Rather better, in fact."

Compliments were Holmes' apologies, Watson knew. He accepted this one quietly, and moved on. "And you are not going to caution me against future encounters?"

"If you engaged in amorous liaisons with other men before your marriage, I was never aware of it. And if your habitual discretion is such as to keep me in the dark, I have no apprehensions of your illicit activities becoming known to the agents of the law."

"Thank you," said Watson, quietly. Another uncomfortable silence settled over them. Watson waited for some response from Holmes and, finding that none was to be had, grasped at the first available excuse for flight. "Well, I should really reply to some of these letters-- though not _that_ one, of course-- and I'm almost out of ink. May I bring you anything from the stationer's?"

_Your bottle of ink is still half-full, and there's a new one in your bottom desk drawer_. "No, thank you," Holmes replied, with equal formality, reaching for the case of cigarettes sitting beside the pipe-rack. By the time he had extracted one of the little paper cylinders, Watson was gone.

Replacing the cigarette case with Watson's words about its predecessor ringing in his ears, Holmes reached out his other hand and lifted the crumpled sheet of paper that had sparked the afternoon's conflagration. It was only right that it should die as it had lived, he thought bitterly. Withdrawing his matches from his waistcoat pocket, Holmes lit his cigarette, took a long drag, and applied the match-end to the note in his hand. The heavy paper burned slowly, and he held it until his fingertips ached before dropping it and stomping upon the remaining fragment. _All the torments of this world_, thought Holmes. The past hour had held torments enough, no doubt, but he did not intend to allow the hateful words of some ignorant fool to take away the best thing in his life. They were Holmes and Watson, and, come what may, that was not going to change.

**The End**


	7. Ending #2b

Holmes had drawn himself up very straight in his seat; he always held on tightest to his dignity at the moments when he needed it most.

"I should not blame you, Watson, if, between the Reichenbach and this, you come to believe me the most deplorable liar in England. But I beg you to believe that I trust you implicitly, and, in proof of it, I intend to do what I should have years ago, and tell you the truth."

Holmes was terribly pale, and fidgeting, though so minutely that even Watson's well-trained eyes would not have picked up the motion had Holmes been a few feet farther away. He took a bracing breath and then began, very quickly, to speak.

"You have long been aware that I have no great admiration for women or the female form, but you have also, I know, been accustomed to think me a cold, sterile, ascetic creature, a man who might as well not have a body at all. That is what I wished you to believe, but it is not the truth. I enjoy--in fact, I find quite necessary, on occasion--the company of my fellow men (taking 'company' in the broadest possible sense). I have kept this knowledge from you in the past, partly for fear of losing your regard, and partly because I have not wished to make you an accomplice, after the fact, to those illegal acts which my condition," Holmes spared a brief instant to sneer over the word, "prompts. Both of these objections I have set aside for the moment in consideration of the simple fact that you deserve to know. You deserved to know years ago, as a matter of fact, but that grotesque bit of correspondence seems, rather unexpectedly, to have been the necessary impetus to propel me beyond my own reservations. I..." Here Holmes hesitated, but swiftly collected himself, and continued, "I am not entirely certain what your reaction to this revelation will be. I believe I know you well enough to be sure that you will not feel it necessary to turn me over to the police, but beyond that I dare not speculate. I comprehend that you may not find it comfortable to share quarters, or perhaps even to share a friendship, with a man of my habits; if it would ease your mind in any way, I am more than willing to offer you my solemn promise that my behavior towards you shall never alter in the slightest degree from what it has been in the past. I very much hope that this assurance will be sufficient to ease your mind, but if it is not..." He stopped rather suddenly. 'If it is not, I am not sure what I will do with myself,' was a phrase too appalling for Holmes to so much as contemplate, no matter how true it may have been. In lieu of any better ending, he simply allowed the sentence to remain open, leaving its ending to Watson's imagination.

Holmes had studiously avoided looking at his friend while he spoke, but as the moments dragged on with no response he could not help looking over at Watson. The doctor wore not one but a dozen expressions, which shifted and changed from to 'surprised' to 'stupefied' to 'utterly poleaxed' by the instant. He turned to meet Holmes' gaze, but seemed incapable of speech.

Holmes' nerves were on edge, and Watson's silence was hardly helpful in that regard. In a frenzy of nervous energy, he leaped from the settee and began to pace, stopping to sift through the detritus on the mantel, darting over to straighten the tablecloth. "For heaven's sake, Watson, stop gaping like a fish. Surely the fact that I am not unmoved by the variations of the human form is not so very shocking; you have attempted many times to push some simpering female into my arms in the hopes that I would suddenly betray an interest, after all. And the fact that my tastes run to men rather than women, while perhaps rather out of the common, is not deserving of so dramatic a response as that. After all, half of the species is similarly afflicted, and you do not goggle so at _them_."

"Yes," Watson finally managed, as Holmes spun back to face him. "But you have done more than fail to betray an interest in romance: you have actively scorned and shunned it. I see now, of course, that your posturing on the subject of love has been no more than a blind, but it was a very effective one, and you will forgive me if it takes me a moment after drawing it aside to cease blinking at the sunlight."

Holmes raised an eyebrow. "Poetry, Watson? You do not generally indulge in poetry when you are angry..."

Watson understood that the statement was a question. "Of course I'm not angry," Watson responded, with a smile. "Holmes, if I were angry every time you did something so trivial as waiting a decade to tell me that you have been known, on occasion, to sleep with other men, I would spend rather a vast percentage of my life being incensed. It took me seven years to learn that you have a brother, after all."

Holmes quirked his head, pleased but puzzled. "Most men would not equate the knowledge that I possess a brother with the revelation that I enthusiastically flout the laws of country, church and society on a semi-regular basis."

"Most men have not spent much time in the company of Mr. Sherlock Holmes," Watson replied. "That particular pastime is an excellent education in accepting the out-of-the-ordinary-- and in judging morality as separate from anyone's laws. Our very first case together introduced me to a murderer who was nobler than his victims, and yet vermin like James Windibank, who would ruin for life the happiness of a girl living under his protection for the sake of a hundred pounds a year, are beyond the reach of the police. I know very well that a man who breaks the law may yet be a good man. Even if I had been inclined before we met to consider an inverted nature to reflect ill on a man's character as a whole, as our anonymous correspondent so obviously does, I hope that the benefit of my experiences since would have convinced me to adopt a more broadminded stance. And even if it had not, I know you too well to think ill of you for so minor an aspect of your character, Holmes. What you do in bed cannot change the exemplary character of those acts you perform outside of that limited locale."

Holmes eyes were rather wide, and his lips quivered, once only, before he regained his control. "Thank you, Watson. I could not possibly have hoped for so understanding a response to such a disclosure." He smiled, the tiny, brief, tight-lipped smile which he reserved for moments when he was truly affected. "I never get your limits, my dear friend."

"Fortunately for me. You never could resist a mystery." Watson's smile brightened, and then faded. "Holmes..."

Holmes stiffened. He ought to have known it could not possibly be as easy as _that_. "Yes, Watson?"

"There is one thing I am not yet sure of. I had been accustomed to understand that you scorned love in both its physical and emotional manifestations. I am now aware that you are not, in fact, invulnerable to the more tangible aspects of desire. But... well, what I suppose I wish to ask is, have you ever been in love?"

Holmes' mind turned a thousand revolutions in an instant, attempting to light upon the wisest response. "Why, Watson, I am surprised at you. A doctor like yourself ought to know that men who suffer from my affliction are incapable of achieving that emotion."

"Bosh," Watson replied promptly. "Love is not limited to persons of opposite genders any more than friendship is exclusive to those whose sex is the same. I am sure you do not believe such a thing."

Holmes fingered the fringe at the edge of the tablecloth, avoiding his friend's eyes but never letting his chin dip out of its haughtiest pose. "Then I must be the exception."

Watson stood, and walked to stand a few feet from his friend. "For a man so adept at telling falsehoods, you do it remarkably badly where your own feelings are concerned," Watson said gently.

Holmes looked up. Watson took a step forward. And then something slammed shut, _hard_, behind Holmes eyes.

"Don't." Holmes' voice was harsh, commanding and, buried so deeply below all else that no one who did not know him very, very well would have noticed, nervous. Watson, of course, knew him entirely well enough.

"And supposing I wish to?" Watson asked, in velveteen tones, coming one step closer until only a few inches separated them.

Holmes retreated a step in the direction of the windows, though without turning his face away. "You do not. Nor do I wish you to."

Watson's smile was serpentine. "I believe you admitted not five minutes ago that there are still some things about me which you do not know. And yet you seem very certain of what I want." Their dance continued-- one step forward, one back, Holmes turning skillfully to avoid being backed into the wall.

"I know that you had a wife, and that you loved her."

"That hardly proves anything about the situation at hand." One step forward; one step back.

"Most men who had wives and loved them do not go about attempting to back their inverted friends into corners."

"And we had also established, equally recently, that I am not most men." Forward; back.

"You are not. You are my only friend, and I am an impossible, drug-addled lunatic savant who has managed, by some strange trick of the fates, to find the only man in the world willing to endure my company. I know very well that you possess almost unimaginable compassion; even if I did not observe it hourly in your behavior to others, only such a trait could inspire your continued patience in the face of my many misdeeds. I accept that it is the basis of our friendship. But I will not, I cannot allow you to seduce me from a sense of pity."

Watson's eyebrows rose. "Pity? Do you truly believe that?" Another advance was met by another retreat.

"What else is there to believe?"

Watson stood very still, and gazed at Holmes very intently. "It is entirely unlike you to form beliefs without facts, Holmes. And I am sure that there are more than a few relevant facts which you do not yet possess." The doctor made no move to continue his pursuit, leaving Holmes more unnerved by this sudden calm than he had been by the pursuit.

"You might be interested to hear, for example," Watson continued, "that the first time I kissed a man--or, to be strictly accurate, a boy, for we were of an age--I was fourteen years old. You may consider it a salient detail that the devotion that inspired Murray to risk his own skin for mine in Afghanistan was somewhat more than comradely. And it might help you to know that, on the sixth night after we moved in to Baker Street, I dreamed of black hair and grey eyes and white skin on still whiter sheets. Similar dreams have found me no less than once a week, every week since then, even during those last three miserable years when I believed that only in sleep would I ever see you again. Perhaps you would like to be aware how I fought against waking, preferring unreality to a world that did not have you in it."

Holmes was finding it, somehow, not an entirely simple matter to inhale. Though Watson still had not moved, Holmes stepped back one last time, and found his back against his own bedroom door.

It seemed less than an instant to Holmes before Watson, finding his prey trapped at last, had caught him up. And then the doctor's hand was on his neck, and his voice was announcing, "I'm going to kiss you now, Sherlock Holmes."

Holmes had opened his mouth, with the halfhearted intention of protesting, and had found himself suddenly both unable and unwilling to do any such thing.

"Holmes," Watson mentioned, some moments later, "I don't believe you ever did answer my question."

"Which question?" Holmes asked, dazedly.

"Have you ever been in love?"

Holmes made a valiant and moderately successful attempt to roll his eyes. "Really, Watson, just because I permitted you to..."

Another interruption followed-- this one rather longer, and decidedly more enthusiastic.

"I believe," said Holmes finally, gasping for breath, "that it is a distinct possibility."

"Allow me to convince you, " said Watson, turning the door-handle suddenly, and catching his friend as the latter tripped his way inside.

 

******************

"It is a pity we'll have to destroy it," Watson said, his words ruffling the hair of the emphatically naked detective in his arms.

"It is a horrible, vicious scrap of paper, and your affection for it is entirely unmerited. Besides, it's hardly the sort of thing we can afford to leave lying about," Holmes commented to the doctor's collarbone.

"I know that very well, but one must at least appreciate the irony. I consider myself to have gained a very great deal from that 'horrible, vicious scrap of paper.'"

"Nonsense, Watson. The note accomplished nothing. This was entirely our own doing."

The collective warmed Watson even more than the feeling of the man curled up against him. "I understand we shall have to burn it, Holmes. But you might at least allow me to keep the envelope."

Holmes sighed dramatically. "Oh, very well, Watson. You really can be appallingly sentimental, you know."

With a degree of energy with which Holmes would hardly have credited him at such a moment, Watson bounded from the bed, pulled the letter from the pocket of his waistcoat where it languished on the floor, tossed it on the fire, and was pinning Holmes to the mattress before his lover could even protest his absence. "And you wouldn't have me any other way, my dear Holmes."

A smile flirted its way across Holmes' lips. "Well, perhaps not," he said, and pulled Watson into a kiss.

**The End**


End file.
